Ephemeral Art: What And What Are Its Characteristics?
Currently, it seems that we live immersed in a frenetic wave of ephemeral art, that is, non-permanent art that is created without the intention of lasting over time. Creations that use the human body as a support are ephemeral art: makeup, body painting, hairdressing and tattooing, among others; but so are manifestations such as gastronomy, pyrotechnic shows or so-called life art, for example.
What is ephemeral art and what are its characteristics? What conditions must a work have to be considered ephemeral? Is it true that ephemeral art is an exclusive manifestation of modernity…? In today’s article, we will try to answer these and other questions. Join us.
The word ephemeral comes from the Greek ephêmeros and would mean “that lasts one day.” Therefore, Ephemeral art is any creation that meets this basic premise: transience in time That is to say, ephemeral artistic expressions have no intention of continuity and, from the moment they are created, both their authors and the public know that they have an expiration date. Of course, they don’t have to last a day, as the Greeks said. It can be a week, or a month, or a year. But they inevitably end up being dismantled or erased.
Their very temporality means, therefore, that they disappear quickly and that we preserve few vestiges of them. Nowadays it is easier to immortalize this type of art, since, through video and photography, we can forever capture that creation destined to disappear.
This is what happens with body decoration work or light and sound shows, for example However, what happened when nothing existed to perpetuate the work? Well, quite simply, it was lost, although there were always artists who were willing to make engravings or drawings of the work in question to preserve it from time and oblivion.
This may lead us to the next question: is ephemeral art something exclusive to the 20th and 21st centuries? The answer seems to be obvious: of course not. And not only because makeup, hairstyle and other bodily artistic manifestations have existed since humans have been on earth, but also because ephemeral works of art have been created since ancient times in other areas that we may not imagine, such as architecture. But, let us start at the beginning.
commemorate the power
Ephemeral art, especially architectural art, has always been linked to celebrations, both religious and civil. Even in a civilization as “stony” and monumental as ancient Egypt, written accounts of ephemeral monuments have been found, built on the occasion of some festival related to the pharaoh or the gods. Also in Roman times we can find ephemeral art, especially linked to military parades.
Fashion was on the rise throughout the centuries of the Middle Ages, but the peak came in the Renaissance and, fundamentally, in the Baroque Special mention goes to the magnificent triumphal arches, built with ephemeral materials to celebrate the arrival of a king or an important figure in the current city. During the Renaissance and Baroque, triumphal arches in imitation of Roman honorific structures became incredibly fashionable.
Thus, we have the arch of the Saint-Denis Gate, built on the occasion of the entry of Henry II to Paris, in 1549; and, in a more recent period, we find the (no less than) thirteen triumphal arches of Philip III for his arrival in Lisbon, in 1619, paid for by the city’s guilds.
commemorate the death
Another architecture that gained special relevance in the Baroque (due to its special relationship with the Memento Mori so characteristic of the time) is the catafalque or funerary mound, a structure made with ephemeral materials that celebrated the funeral of an important person, generally linked to the royalty. The catafalques did not always contain the coffin of the deceased, as they were often erected in the churches of the main towns in commemoration of the transfer of the character.
Like all ephemeral constructions, they were made with cheap and perishable materials, such as paper, wood, cardboard or fabric In general, and once the funeral was over, the catafalque was dismantled and its materials were used, so it is strange that any are preserved. There are, however, notable exceptions, such as the catafalque preserved in the parish church of Arbulo, in Álava (Spain), although in this case it is an example from the 19th century.
Symbol of science and progress
Already in the 19th century we find one of the most famous manifestations of ephemeral art: the universal exhibitions, fairs where the technological and cultural advances of various countries were exhibited. The first universal exhibition was held in London in 1851 (promoted, by the way, by Albert, the prince consort), which was a resounding success and donated to posterity the famous Crystal Palace, sadly destroyed in a fire in 1937.
At the universal exhibitions, each country was allocated a piece of land, on which it built a pavilion of ephemeral architecture to locate its exhibition As the works were supposed to last the duration of the exhibition, at the end of the exhibition they were dismantled and their materials used.
There are extraordinary cases of conservation of these ephemeral constructions, such as the case of the aforementioned Crystal Palace in London (which survived until the fire, almost a hundred years), or that of the very famous Eiffel Tower, destined for the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1889 and which is currently an indisputable symbol not only of the city, but of all of France. By the way, and as Miguel Ángel Cajigal (1981) states in his book Another History of Architecture (see bibliography), what we call Eiffel was, in reality, designed by two of Gustave’s employees, Nouguier and Koechlin, and “expanded ” by Sauvestre.
Of course, ephemeral architecture still exists today. We constantly see it at festivals, celebrations and various parties, following in the wake that our ancestors had already started. Curious is the case of ice art or architecture, which is gaining special popularity lately and whose most paradigmatic example is found in the Ice Hotel in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden.
But, above all, what is gaining real popularity are other ephemeral manifestations such as shows made with fire, light, sound and water, or life art performances Life art or action art, which has its roots in manifestations such as Dadaism, is committed to the constant intervention of the viewer. Thus, we find the happening (in which the spectator becomes an active subject of the performance) or installationism, which has a specific duration and allows the intervention of the spectator.
Also quite common in our time is land art, an artistic expression that uses nature as a support, or urban art, personified especially in graffiti. Although more and more spaces are currently being set up for this type of art (spaces that aim to remain in the urban space), graffiti is included in ephemeral art, since, initially, it is carried out on places not intended for such end and, as such, the graffiti is subsequently erased.
